Chasing a Blond Moon (13 page)

Candi was trying to pin the girl, but she was fighting and wild.

Service felt something hard strike him in the upper left arm, but got hold of one of the girl's hands and twisted it behind her. Candi had the other arm and cuffed the wrists. The two of them lay still for a second, breathing hard, not talking. The girl cursed, her words muffled because her face was pushed into the grass.

A flash of light burst from the open door of the trailer and one of the front windows, followed almost simultaneously by the thump of an explosion, the sound a sibilant
boompf
rather than a bang. The trailer erupted with white light and fire and was followed by a loud secondary explosion. Bits of glass, pieces of metal, plywood, and other debris rained down them, some of it burning and igniting fires in the nearby grass.

Service covered his head.

Someone hurtled out the door opening and hit the ground, screaming, her head on fire.

“I've got her,” Service said. “I've got her.”

He took off his coat, put it over the girl's head, and rolled her to put out the fire.

He heard McCants on the radio, calmly calling for help.

The girl inside his jacket was whimpering and moaning.

Lights jounced across the field toward the trailer.

McCants left the first girl and went to the man, who had not moved.

Service watched her check his pulse as the approaching vehicles illuminated the area.

“Fuck,” Candi said.

Service carefully removed the coat from the second girl's head and looked at her with his MAG-LITE. Her face was black, burned severely. She still had hair, but only in patches. He turned away without making a further assessment.

“Candi?”

“I'm okay,” she said.

When she walked over to him he saw that her head was covered in blood. “You're bleeding,” he said.

“You too,
kemo sabe.
”

He looked down at his left arm, saw blood dripping down. “Verse?” he asked.

Candi McCants shook her head. “Let's get these two away from the fire.”

The drug team came in, dressed in black, weapons at the ready.

EMTs took the burned girl. Cops began batting at fires with some sort of bags.

One of the drug team members checked Bryce Verse. A call went out to the Alger County medical examiner. He was attending a medical meeting in Wisconsin. Delta County's M.E. was covering for him. Service listened to the call to Vince Vilardo. Poor Vince. Getting close to retirement and still catching the shit.

“Let's take a look at that arm,” a Troop said.

Service didn't resist as the man rolled up his sleeve, then asked an EMT for scissors. The EMT came over and cut the sleeve to expose the wound. “You're gonna need some stitches,” the EMT said.

“Just clean it and tape it up for now,” Service said. If Vince was coming, he could do the real repairs.

“Not a good idea,” the Troop said.

“Just do it,” Service said, holding out his arm and watching the blood pooling.

Before Vince Vilardo arrived, the drug team commander called a quick meeting. He was a sergeant who had just moved up from a downstate post, tall and businesslike.

“You two were supposed to wait,” he said.

“Bite me,” McCants said. She had cut her head in the scuffle, and had a bandage wrapped around her forehead.

“I'm not accusing you of anything,” the commander said, holding up his hands.

“Fuck off,” McCants repeated. Service squeezed her arm gently and calmly explained. “We waited, but we heard a shot and had to move to it. The guy appeared in the doorway, the girl we cuffed shot him, then she turned and popped the other girl. Then the trailer went up and the second girl came flying out on fire.”

“You
saw
the girl shoot the man?”

“No,” Service said. “We saw him in the door, heard the shot, saw him fall out. Then she appeared in the door brandishing her gun. She said she'd ‘shot the monster.'”

“Why were you two here?”

“We had a tip that Verse, the dead guy, was just out on parole, in town with two minor females, that they were high and he was armed and bragging about shooting deer.”

“Why didn't you call for help?”

“Call who and for what? There's one county car and one state car on duty at night,” McCants said with obvious irritation. “As soon as we realized it was a meth lab, we called you guys.”

“I just wish it had gone down differently,” the team commander said.

“It went down the way it went down,” Service said. “The burned girl?”

“Not good,” the commander said. “GSW to right chest and third-degree burns to the head and shoulders.”

“Man,” McCants said.

“The truck over there is stolen,” Service said. “We called it in.”

“Okay,” the team commander said. “Let's all stand down, let hazmat get to work on the site, not that there's a hell of a lot left.”

Service watched three people in special suits move into the ruins. They looked like spacemen.

“That's
our
fault?” McCants snapped.

Service squeezed her arm again.

“I didn't say that,” the commander said. “Did either of you draw or discharge a weapon?”

“No,” Service said.

“No,” McCants said.

Service was relieved that neither of them had drawn.

“Relax,” the commander said, offering a pack of cigarettes. Service took one and let the man light it for him. “Rough?”

“Rougher to be dead,” Service said. “Everything was quiet and then the shit hit the fan.”

“Welcome to the drug war,” the cop said.

When Vince Vilardo arrived he took one look at Grady Service and his jaw dropped.

“Grady?”

“Present and still accounted for.”

Vince's normally steady hand was shaking as he looked at the wound. “You want to go back to the hospital so I can do this right?”

“Can you do it here?”

“You're going back to the hospital,” his friend said in his doctorly voice.

Service didn't argue.

One of the team members brought over a hunting knife. There was blood on the blade.

“It was where you had the scuffle,” she reported.

Service thought back. The girl had said she was going to cut off the monster's head. He should have picked up on that. The presence of a gun often blocked out the presence of other threats. Rule one of cop work: Pay attention to everything you see
and
hear.

McCants sat sullenly next to Service. “You okay?” he asked.

“Headache,” she said. “Did we fuck up?” she whispered.

“No way,” he said. “It just went down and we did what we could.”

“Still,” she said. “One dead, maybe two.”

“Forget it, Candi. Move on.”

They both rode behind the ambulance in Vilardo's Suburban. Verse's body and the injured girl were in the ambulance. The other girl was in a squad headed for Munising to be booked. Members of the drug team said they would follow with the officers' vehicles.

“How's Kate Nordquist?” Service asked.

“What
about
Kate?” McCants asked, perking up.

“She's got a seriously injured leg,” Vilardo said. “She could lose it.”

Service winced at the thought of amputation.

“
Kate?
” McCants said.

Service explained what he knew.

“You didn't tell me,” she said.

“We had other things to think about,” he said.

“Don't patronize me,” she snapped at him. “If you knew, I should have known.”

“Can it, Candi.”

“Did you see Nantz?” Service asked Vilardo.

“She was still at the hospital when I left. She'll still be there with Moody.”

Vince took both of them into the emergency room and stitched them. McCants got four, Service got eleven. They both got tetanus boosters and a bolus of antibiotics.

McCants was acting poochy and Service left her alone, knowing she needed to come down from stress in her own way and her own time. She would come out of it.

He saw Nantz standing outside the emergency room. When he walked out she came over to him and hugged him. There were no tears, only the warmth of her touch.

“I called Walter,” she said, “as soon as I heard.”

“He doesn't need to know.”

“He's
your
son,” she said, “and when his father gets hurt, he deserves to know.”

“You shouldn't have called him,” he said.

“Afraid somebody might care?” she said.

They found Gutpile Moody sitting with McCants, who was shaking her head.

“Guess what?” she said.

Service shrugged. He was in no mood for guessing games.

“The vehicle that hit Kate was a 2002 dark blue Ford 150.”

“Plate verified?”

“It was Verse,” she said. “Probably afraid to directly confront Eddie, so he took his vengeance on Kate.”

Moody sighed. “Verse is yellow. I busted him several times. Too stupid to learn. Worst combo in the world, no brains and high ambition. I wish I knew they'd released him. He wasn't supposed to be out until next winter. Guess I won't have to deal with him anymore.”

Service shook his head in disbelief. What were the odds? Then he smiled in resignation. When it came to crime and coincidence, odds often went out the window.

“You still want me to check on that Wisconsin thing?” McCants asked.

“I'm sorry I held back on Kate,” he said.

“I probably would've done the same,” she admitted. “I'll get hold of Wisconsin soon as I can.” She offered her hand in a gentle high five.

Service wanted to look in on Kate Nordquist, but she was doped and out. “Tomorrow,” a nurse said.

Moody said he was staying put in the hospital until she was out of the woods.

“Could be three or four days before they know about the leg,” Vince Vilardo said.

“I'm staying,” Moody said.

As they got to the hospital lobby, Captain Ware Grant was coming in. He looked tired, his skin color gray and dull. “You and McCants?”

“We're fine, Cap'n.”

“Officer Nordquist?”

“Her leg is bad. They've done surgery, but it's still touch and go that she'll keep it.”

The captain's eyes blazed.

“They got the man who did this,” Service said.

“Who?”

“Name is Verse. He was in a meth lab. A fourteen-year-old girl shot him.”

The captain patted Service's shoulder gently and walked into the hospital.

In Nantz's truck heading for home in Gladstone, she rubbed his leg and said nothing.

“The Cap'n doesn't look healthy,” Service said, thinking about the stroke the captain had had last year. Doctors had returned him to duty, declaring he had no deficits; still, his color wasn't normal.

“Everyone's tired,” Nantz said. “You pick up on any vibrations from Gutpile?”

He shook his head.

“He's in love with Kate,” she said.

“
Gutpile?
”

“Yut,” she said. “Mr. Solo himself.”

“Does she know?”

“Yut.”

“And?”

“Let's just say the feelings are not unreciprocated.”

8

Newf came to Service's side when he walked into the house, bumped his thigh, and lifted her head for his hand. “Have you seen Cat?” he asked Nantz, looking around. It had been days since he had seen her. He had found the animal years ago in a cloth bag of eight kittens somebody had drowned in Slippery Creek near his cabin. Why this one survived was beyond him, but she had lived and turned into a feline misanthrope. He had never gotten around to naming her, which made her an animal he could relate to.

Service checked the answering machine. There were two messages, the first from Walter. “Just checking to see how things are over there.”

“Now we're things?” Service grumbled.

Nantz held up her hand. “Your son
called.
He's concerned.”

“He didn't need to know,” Service grumbled.

“You can be such a jerk,” Nantz said, “but a funny one.” She was smiling.

The second message was from Gus Turnage. “Hey, Walt called and said you'd hit some shit. Give me a bump. Walt has some ideas we both ought to hear. He's a great kid, Grady.”

“Walt?” Service said to Nantz.

“Your son, fool.”

“It's not his place to call Gus,” he grumbled.

“Stop being an asshole.”

Service started for the stairs but saw lights flash in the long driveway.

Nantz looked out the window. “It's Lorelei,” she said.

“Aren't we lucky,” Service said. “Shouldn't she be out kissing asses and babies?”

“
Grady,
” Nantz said with a warning growl.

State senator and gubernatorial candidate Lorelei Timms stepped into the foyer. She was tall and a little heavy, with intense eyes and medium-length hair streaked silver. She wore a dark dress and high heels that made her even taller.

“I heard about today,” the senator said.

Service wondered how she'd learned so quickly, but as a senator gunning for the top spot in state government, she was a full-blooded member of the Lansing tribe, which had its own drums and ways of passing information. He responded with a nod.

“You look like shit,” she said, “if you don't mind my word choice. You, on the other hand,” she said, turning to Nantz, “look like someone just off a Milan fashion runway.”

“Too short,” Nantz said. The women smiled at each other.

Timms turned back to Service. “I don't like police officers getting injured in the line of duty.”

“Get used to it,” Service said.

“I know the reality, but I don't have to like it.” Service expected her to spout some kind of campaign slogan, but she turned to Nantz again. “Whit and I got a sitter for the kids so we could have a night alone. It's going to be campaigning every day and night from here on. But when I heard about what went on up here, we decided we could take our night at the House of Ludington.” The House of Ludington was an Escanaba landmark, a Queen Anne–style resort hotel that had been built before the turn of the twentieth century—at a time when Great Lakes steamships brought tourists from Chicago and Milwaukee. The hotel still had one of the best kitchens in the Midwest.

“You've pulled even in the polls,” Nantz said.

“Crossing the finish line first is what matters,” the senator said. “Whit and I brought Jill Yonikan with us. She's an old friend and an orthopedic surgeon in Traverse City. She was at Henry Ford for ages. She's going to help your friend Kate.”

Nantz smiled.

“Kate will be in good hands,” Senator Timms said.

“Our doctors aren't good enough?” Service said testily.

Timms turned and stared hard at him. “In a word, no. You have some good people up here, but not nearly enough, and not enough specialists to make a difference.”

“You're going to change that?”

“I'm going to try. I'm at least going to give this area some of the attention and respect it deserves. You heard what Kwami called the U.P.?”

Kwami Kilpatrick was Detroit's current mayor. He had been quoted as calling the U.P. “Michigan's Mississippi.” The remark had riled a lot of people, not just in the Yoop, but the mayor had not apologized.

“He's in your party.”

“Yes, he is, and he has a right to say what he thinks; but if he keeps kicking parts of the state that aren't Detroit, it's Detroit that's going to suffer. We have to get people thinking together—as one state—not Detroit, et cetera.”

Good luck, Service thought. He had never heard Lori Timms speak with such conviction. Before this he had thought of her as a naive, middle-aged do-gooder from old money, but there was a hardness in her voice that suggested she was more capable of real convictions and command than he had ever imagined. But she'd have to win before anyone would know if she had what it took.

“You belong in bed,” the senator said. “And Maridly and I need to talk.”

Service shrugged, went up to the bedroom and called Gus Turnage. “It's Grady. I got your message.”

“You okay?”

“NBD, some stitches and some wrestling.”

“Fourteen-year-old tweaker, I heard. How's Nordquist?”

“They're worried about her leg.”

“Man,” Gus said. “Any leads on who did it?”

Gus wasn't as well informed as he was making out. “They got him.” He didn't volunteer any details. These would come out soon enough. “You talked to the boy.”

“Walt had dinner with Shark and me a couple of nights ago and I told him about the professor at Tech. He called me this morning and said he's learned some things about the professor's son.”

Service was irked. “Dammit, Gus. Why did you tell him? It's not his concern.”

“He's interested in what we do.”

“It's not your place, Gus.”

“Don't be stupid. Your son's taking an interest. I think we should hear what he has to say.”

“He's just a kid.”

“He's his old man's kid—only smarter.”

“It's not his business.”

“How many times have you stuck your nose into stuff that wasn't your business? He's just trying to help. When can you get over here?”

Service thought for a moment. “I need to talk to Grinda in the morning, then I can drive up. Dinner at six at the Douglass?” The Douglass House Saloon was the oldest bar and restaurant in Houghton and a hangout for the students and faculty from the university.

“Six it is. Don't go hard on Walt, Grady. You going to call him?”

“I'll take care of it.”

Service called his son's dorm room and was relieved to get the answering machine. He told his son that he and Gus would meet him the next night at the Douglass at six.

Some time during the night Nantz slid into bed with him and spooned. “You awake?” she whispered.

“I am now.”

“Did you call Walter?”

“Are you checking up on me?”

“Just asking,” she said gently. “I told Lori I'll fly for her. I'm going to take my bird to TC tomorrow and leave it there. I agreed to one month, that's all. I told her I need a month to get ready for the academy.”

“Are you okay with this?” she asked. “And don't say, ‘not a problem.'”

“You're a fully growed woman.”

“Jesus, you sound like Jed Clampett.”

“It's your decision.”

“I'll get home every chance I get,” she said. “I'm not going to do anything to jeopardize the academy. What did Walter say?”

“He didn't. I left a message on his machine.”

“Grinda?”

“I'm going to see her in the morning.” But he had not talked to her, so he got out of bed, took the portable into the hallway and punched in her cell phone number.

“Officer Grinda,” she answered, her tone all business. Grinda was a thirty-something Swede who lived near Bruce Crossing in Ontonagon County. She had fashioned a record of getting the job done well, but was also known for not willingly cooperating with other officers. She was pathologically polite and reserved, with wild brown hair that always looked windblown. She had physically tangled with many lawbreakers and was known by other officers as Sheena. Although she had ended up saving his life the previous year, he hadn't worked with her since. What their relationship would be now remained an open question.

“Service. I got your message.”

“Thanks for the call back. Sounds like you and Candi had a nasty day.”

“You've had worse,” he said.

As usual, she got right to business. “I had a complaint about some freeloaders at Burned Dam Campground on the Tamarack River. Just before I got there a bear ran across Forest Highway 4500. It was trailing something, so I stopped, followed it, and found it tangled in some cedar roots along the river. It was exhausted. There was steel cable around its neck—like some sort of snare set. I got Doc Emmarpus from Watersmeet and we darted the animal. It's caged at the vet clinic now.”

“
Joe
Emmarpus? I thought he retired to New Mexico.” Emmarpus had been a vet in the western U.P. for more than forty years.

“He did. This is Doctor Rosary Emmarpus, Joe's granddaughter. She was practicing in Alaska, but when Joe decided to call it quits, she bought his practice. She's a little odd, but people like her. She told me she had seen cable used like this up in Alaska—by bear poachers. After we talked I tried to back-track the animal, but I lost the trail and had to call it quits. I'm going back in at first light.”

“You mind if I join you—say five?”

“I could use the help,” she said. “Let's meet on 4500 where it crosses the Tamarack.”

She wanted help? This was a stark change from the Grinda he had first worked with last year.

“See you then.”

“I'll have the donuts,” she said. “You sure you're okay from today?”

“Just sore. See you at five.”

He set the alarm for 3 a.m. when he got back in the bedroom and got into bed.

“Can we cuddle?” Nantz asked. “I need to be close, skin to skin.”

“I'll need to get up at three,” he said, “to meet Sheena.”

“I'll make sure,” she said, settling into the pillow.

He fell asleep basking in the fragrance of her skin and the shared warmth of their bodies.

The alarm startled him awake. When he moved his legs to get out of bed, Nantz hooked his waist with her arm and pulled him back. “You're leaving and I won't be here when you get back tonight.” Her hand was on his thigh and then higher. “There,” she said, fondling him. “Up at three, just like you said.”

She rolled on top and guided him inside and he didn't care if he was going to be late. “You just lay still and let your nurse do the work,” she said, but it was over for both of them too quickly to savor their lovemaking. “That'll take the edge off,” she said. “Get dressed and I'll get the coffee.”

He found her in the kitchen, as usual, clad only in panties. Newf was following her around, hoping for people food. His double thermos was full and she had two pieces of rye toast in the toaster. A glass of OJ was on the counter, along with his vitamins. He threw all the pills down at once and she grimaced. She hated to swallow pills, especially anything larger than a BB. When the toast popped she put them in his hand, gave him the thermos, kissed him long, and squeezed his butt. “Don't forget me.”

“Not likely,” he said.

Cat was outside, anxiously waiting for somebody to let her in. He opened the door for the cat and called back to Nantz, “Miss Walkabout has returned.”

The cat was already growling for food. Newf gave the temperamental animal her space and watched her make her demands.